someone might have more info
9/28/2019 at 9:22 AM
Committed2Brandon said "The Impending Loss of Population and what to do to Stem the Tide
I'm starting this post to ask how can we ensure that our city continues to grow in the future. So here's the issue.
Canadians have a very low birth rate – currently 1.6 on average, absent immigration a country generally needs a birth rate of over 2 (around 2.1) in order to maintain it's population. Thankfully Canada has a strong immigration rate, but a good portion of that population tends to migrate towards the larger cities, and stay in the southern Ontario/Quebec corridor, or BC and Alberta, where economies tend to be stronger, and for the most part weather is often more mild.
Further, even immigrants in the future are going to become harder and harder to find.
Elon Musk, the founder of Tesla, recently said that population collapse could be the gravest problem of our time. He questions where immigration is going to come from when over half of our worlds countries have birth rates below replacement levels.
So I ask, what can Brandon do to ensure that we continue to grow in the future?
I think future growth is important, first because it helps ensure that we have a steady flow of people to purchase our houses/condos/real estate from us when we ultimately leave them behind. In some parts of the world real estate is in a decline because of the lack of new people being born. For Canadians our equity in real estate tends to make up a significant portion of our savings and in particular our retirement savings, seeing that equity depreciate or properties left vacant because of a lack of growth, or even depopulation cannot be a very good thing for our city. Further, population growth is good for innovation and I think just overall to a communities well being.
I think more can be done for Brandon and Westman, I'm not sure if Maple Leaf was the last major industry development in our city, but I have to ask, has it really been 20 years since we have seen a major development of that size? Can't more be done by our politicians and wealthiest individuals to attract more industry to our city?
So here are some of my thoughts, what are some of the others that Brandon has?
>: Perhaps our city and region can attempt to specifically attract certain groups of people which tend to have larger families. Larger families means more kids, and likely continued growth for the future. More traditional and orthodox Catholics and Protestant Christians often have larger families. Perhaps more can be done to assist those religious communities with attracting members from outside of the Westman area. Perhaps we can make Brandon a Bible belt city. Steinbach, Winkler and Morden are good examples of some of the fastest growing areas of Manitoba, whose growth is related in part to the higher birth rate of more traditional Mennonite families in those areas.
>: Home schooled families tend to have larger children – Perhaps we can put more funds and resources into the homeschooling program, and advertise Brandon as a hub for parents wanting to home-school their children.
>: Entrepreneurship and innovation are perhaps the two largest drivers of overall market growth and industry, so why not create an organization within the city whose plan and focus is to put Brandon on the map for being the number one city in the country to foster both.
>: As far as innovation goes, petitioning the provincial government to bring an engineering faculty to Brandon university would likely go miles.
>: I once heard someone suggest that for tourism perhaps there could be an attempt to make Brandon the waterslide capital of Canada much like Wisconsin Dells is the waterslide capital of the US, this would obviously require some significant investment into the city.
>: Brandon is home to a large Koch Chemical plant – The Koch family is also one of the world's wealthiest, and some of the biggest philanthropists, perhaps our politicans could be asking if there is anyway they can help put us on the map?
>: My personal favorite is to put Brandon on the map by offering special financial incentives for charities who headquarter here, and incentives for anyone looking to start a charity to begin it in Brandon.
So those are some of my thoughts, what are yours Brandon? "
But isn't Brandon one of the cities that the Feds want to bring more immigrant families to settle here? I think that was announced about 6 weeks ago.
I know that a few of the best/bigger employers here will help spouses of professionals obtain employment if they decide to move here. So if they do the sons and daughters no doubt are under that umbrella. Nothing Brandon likes better than hiring scores of people from the same family tree.